I recently bought an '04 Mini Cooper. The stock system doesn't sound that great - muddy sound in the mids and lows. I do like that the stock headunit doesn't stand out (it looks OEM, probably because it is) and it has controls built into the steering wheel. I don't want to lose either of these features, so I thought maybe I could upgrade everything else but the h/u.

If I put an equalizer, like the Kicker KQ9 on the front signal from the OEM headunit and then put the output from the KQ9 into a good 4 channel amp into quality speakers, would this sound good?

Basically, is the stock headunit good enough to deliver a good sound or is it a bad building block?